Owing to a negative current/voltage characteristic, some lamps, for example, fluorescent lamps, require current limitation devices. Previously, conventional alternating coils which are connected in series with the lamp in conjunction with a starter were used for this purpose. Owing to the high losses in the inductor, these conventional ballasts have been replaced in recent years by electronic ballasts, by means of which the required system performance (the lamp including the ballast) is considerably reduced with respect to the conventional solutions given approximately the same luminous flux of the lamp. For the NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) market, these electronic ballasts (EBs) are predominantly supplied with connection cables which are soldered fixedly to a printed circuit board of the EB as early as during production. One disadvantage of this is the fact that these connection cables, which have been fixedly soldered in, make manufacture of the electronics, with the fitting, soldering and testing of the electronic components arranged on the printed circuit board, more difficult, since these connection cables take up a considerable amount of physical space and are difficult to manipulate owing to their number and rigidity. With sequential fitting of the individual connection cables there is also the risk of positions or colors being mixed up, i.e. erroneous fitting of cables such that there are increased requirements for quality control checks.
The cables also need to be passed through cutouts in a housing wall of the EB and in the process electrically insulated and mechanically protected. Another disadvantage of the conventional solutions consists in the fact that this mounting step is comparatively complex since, for this purpose, the individual connection cables need to be inserted into plastic bushings and then the plastic bushings need to be threaded into the cutouts in the EB housing wall in a subsequent manufacturing step.